Following the signature of the commercial agreement with FOM this week by Mercedes-Benz, the Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team is pleased to announce that Lewis Hamilton has signed a three-year agreement to race for the team from the 2013 Formula One season.

I don't see how anyone is completly writing off Mercedes in 2013. Each year is a new year, each car is already being built and is in the wind tunnel. The truth is, we don't know. Yes, on the balance of probabilities, they may have a car like this years, but the thing about F1 I like the most, is the unpredictability of it. This year alone we've had 2 midfield teams win, and another come close to winning. Mclaren came out with a dog in 2009, and RBR6 I think was insanely fast, the only car capable of taking turn 8 I believe in Turkey flat. This year, the RBR isn't that quick regularly.

Now I am not predicting Mercedes have something like the Brawn coming out and Hamiltons been told, but I prefer to wait until January before I start defining the season ahead. If Mclaren design another dog, in 2013, can anyone see Button and Perez, who share, it would appear, similar characteristics in driving, dragging it around to wins? Which RBR turns up in 2013; 2010/11 or 2012? Alonso has dragged the fez around all season, so can they produce a winner out of the box in 2013? No, Nothing is set in stone for me.

Btw, I like this site as it doesn't degenerate into a fan boi/haters argument. At the end of the day, it's to discuss F1 matters.

This thread was opened to contain the inevitable flood of emotive posts about Hamilton. It has served that purpose. Long term users of the site will be aware that driver conversations on here inevitably head into fanboy oblivion and closure.

Remarkably, this one hasn't had the fanboy posts that usually blight a thread with the word "Hamilton " in the title. The last few pages have touched on a myriad of topics including engine supply, tyre management and who's who at Mercedes AMG, and some young kid named Mr Beiber. Given that we're again far far away from this thread's topic, I guess we can close this.